Hultgren: Withhold Congress’ pay until budget passes

U.S. Rep. Randy Hultgren, R-Winfield, released the following statement:

“The first bill I introduced as a member of Congress in 2011 was the Constitutional Congressional Pay Accountability Act. I recently [ http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d113:h.r.308:] re-introduced it for the 113th Congress. This straightforward bill, which is barely five pages, would require Congress to pass a budget and all appropriations bills by the beginning of that fiscal year. If the budget doesn’t get passed, members of Congress won’t get paid. It holds everyone’s feet to the fire.

“I’m thrilled to see the House leadership put their support behind this concept. It is an important component to the House’s consideration of a temporary three-month debt ceiling extension and is critical to ensuring we quickly turn to legislating a long-term fix to the unsustainable national debt that is crippling us and future generations.

“We have got to stop using last-minute legislating and short-term fixes. The worst thing we can do for the economy, and especially for people running small businesses, is to constantly keep them in limbo about what the government is going to do next. But it’s not enough just to pass a budget – we need one that shows fiscal responsibility in both the short and long term, in the form of spending restraint and a Balanced Budget Amendment so that spending beyond our means ceases to be a habit for our nation’s leaders.”